


Not a big deal

by imaginaryinspiration



Category: Undertale (Video Game)
Genre: Gen, Hurt and comfort, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, Mostly hurt, Self-Harm, if you wanna feel sad, my dude this is the right place
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-15
Updated: 2019-12-15
Packaged: 2021-02-26 07:20:29
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,371
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21799771
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/imaginaryinspiration/pseuds/imaginaryinspiration
Summary: You don’t know when it started, exactly. It could have been after the first time she left you, or maybe it was after he started ignoring you. Either way, what mattered was that it happened and apparently it wasn’t normal. You didn’t think it was that big of a deal. Why would it be, when it never left any lasting marks?Even when you felt like you just wanted help and you needed to stop, you slapped yourself (haha...literally!) and remembered that it wasn’t actual “self-harm”. You weren’t cutting or burning, and it didn’t leave actual marks, so it was okay and a completely healthy way to deal with negative emotions. (Who were you kidding, at this point?)
Relationships: Frisk & Sans (Undertale)
Comments: 2
Kudos: 64





	Not a big deal

You don’t know when it started, exactly. It could have been after the first time she left you, or maybe it was after he started ignoring you. Either way, what mattered was that it happened and apparently it wasn’t normal. You didn’t think it was that big of a deal. Why would it be, when it never left any lasting marks? 

Anyway, it helped you,  too. When you got angry, you could manage it by punching yourself quietly until you didn’t feel mad anymore. You felt like a toddler, throwing such a tantrum, but at least only you could feel the damage of it and anyway, hitting yourself quietly would hurt less, in the end, than if you cried and she heard you. (You couldn’t be heard. Children should be seen and not heard. If she heard you, then...!) And you had an image to uphold besides the fear of being  punished.  You were the “perfect” child, happy and well behaved, quiet but talking clearly when it was necessary. On the outside, at least. On the inside, well, no one saw that but you. And maybe if there was anyone who cared about you enough to really look closely or pay attention, they could have noticed something was off. (It really wouldn’t have been that hard to read you. You were barely holding it together, as is. Always on the verge of tears or fidgeting, shaking so much it was a wonder no one noticed. They just didn’t pay close enough attention. If only...) But there was no one. 

So you didn’t see any real harm in doing it. Except to your head. Yikes, you had a lot of arm strength when you were mad enough. But you just got so angry sometimes! When your mother talked, ordering you around and only acknowledging you when she believed you had done something wrong and was ready to punish you, you couldn’t control your irritation. In order to not anger her anymore, you would stay quiet and as soon as you could steal away, you’d hide and add more of your own bruises to the ones she had just created. 

But now...

You didn’t _need_ to think that way anymore. You weren’t with _her_ anymore. So why couldn’t you ignore those thoughts, those feelings, those memories? They didn’t matter anymore, yet they still plagued your life. Now, though, the hits were more than just anger management. Now they were a punishment for yourself. An easy one that didn’t require knives and didn’t leave marks that someone would find and then you’d be in big trouble. So it wasn’t a big deal. Even when you felt like you just wanted help and you needed to stop, you slapped yourself (haha...literally!) and remembered that it wasn’t actual “self-harm”. You weren’t cutting or burning, and it didn’t leave actual marks, so it was okay and a completely healthy way to deal with negative emotions. (Who were you kidding, at this point?) 

If you told someone, they would just laugh. Or get mad at you. Probably the latter. So best to keep it secret, even though it got harder when Sans would keep such a close eye on you. What did he think, you would go murder crazy again? (You knew he cared. It was hard to grasp that so instead of pondering over this new emotion and what it could possibly be called, you shoved it to the side and tried to forget about it.)

The hitting wasn’t just any punishment. It was punishment for your sins, for being  _ worthless, a burden, scum, wasting resources, for— _

You could go on and on and _on._ The list was endless, especially when you were trying to sleep and it played through your head like a broken record. 

So they weren’t a big deal. It wasn’t. It wasn’t a big deal. It didn’t matter. None of your problems mattered. You didn’t have any problems. You were a perfect child. Happy and well-behaved (even if your smile was cracking now, dropping a little bit more every time Sans looked at you sympathetically). So why was Sans looking at you now with such a disappointed and worried gaze? Why did he look so sad, so tired, smile drooping, while he held your hands away from your sore forehead and tears filled your eyes? Why did he look that way, if your life was perfect? Was it not?

No, it had to be. It _had to be!_ If it wasn’t....well, you guess you’d crumble. You’d finally break, smile finally cracking, and you’d wail and wail, wishing so badly someone would come to you, fawn over you, while at the same time praying that you were too quiet for anyone to hear, or they were just ignoring you, because that was _familiar,_ it was what you were used to, and this new feeling of people actually caring was scary. You’d break because your entire life would fall before your eyes. You’d built walls of lies around you and fences of deception in order to make sense of the disordered world you had been raised in, with screaming parents who took out their anger on their helpless child and always feeling like you were in danger. Those walls were slowly cracking, jagged lines lacing up and splitting, growing bigger each time something happened to shake your world view. To prove your mother wrong, making you feel like you did matter and you were loved even though she had screamed that wasn’t true. Each time someone did something you so weren’t used to, didn’t expect, like when Toriel told you she loved you and she hugged you instead of hitting, or when Sans smiled at you with adoration, treating you to food at Grillby’s instead of denying it because you had failed in some way you didn’t know or understand. 

You had to tell yourself your life was perfect, because if it wasn’t, you would be in danger. In trouble. _And you_ _ wouldn’t let that happen.  _ Not again. 

And yet, and yet-!

You _didn’t_ have to think that way anymore. You were allowed to admit to yourself your life was not perfect, it was never perfect, you were always broken. You were allowed to let your walls crack and crumble because there was someone who cared, who would fish you out of the rubble and feed you Grillby’s or warm pie. You had that now. It was hard to get used to. Really, _really,_ hard. 

So when Sans held your arms away from your face, finally catching you doing something you had done for longer than you could remember, you still expected him to yell. You expected him to get angry, and dangerous, because even though you were scared of that and you didn’t want it to happen, it was  _familiar_.  And familiar you could deal with. (Even though you wanted so badly to forget, to never deal with anything familiar again. That was scary. New was scary. But so was old. And you were having trouble deciding which was scarier.)

Instead, he hugged you. (What? Why...?) It caught you by complete surprise. He was showing you kindness, when you expected him to do the complete opposite. (What... was this? What was this feeling? You’d felt it before, maybe once, but you’d shoved it aside and ignored it before. Now, though, you explored it and went deeper into that feeling, trying to find a name for it and find out whether it was bad or good. Surprisingly, this foreign emotion was more pleasant than most of the ones you had felt before. Was this...what being loved felt like?) He held you for a long time, and you could feel your shoulder getting wet. Was he shaking? You raised your arms, and, only a little hesitantly, hugged him back. He squeezed you tighter. 

He didn’t force you to talk or explain, which you were utterly grateful for. Maybe another time. Maybe, once you were used to this feeling, when you were no longer scared of the unfamiliar, and you could forget the memories that plagued you. Maybe then. For now, though...for now, you think that you could hug Sans one more time.


End file.
